Bars Not Borders
by PlayerPins
Summary: Conspiracy, confusion and fear grip Shibuya as the Underground is thrown into a civil war which threatens to engulf the Realground. Contains strong language and violence.
1. Day 1: I am not what I am

**Disclaimer:** We don't own The World Ends With You.  
This fan fiction contains **100% Original Characters** but contains absolutely **no** Mary Sues or their male equivalents (be that Marty, Gary or what have you)!  
While you're at it; you should listen to the game's soundtrack while you read this (Calling works great, all of the songs do to be honest). You can find the soundtrack on Youtube if you can't find the copy you no doubt bought legaly. Enjoy!

* * *

Vision returned to me, slowly but surely. I hadn't expected the semi-blinding light, not to mention it was daylight outside, so my eyes were having trouble adjusting.

I lay on my side, staring into a crowd; had it all been a dream?

'The Reaper's Game' – put up your most treasured possession as collateral, survive 7 days to come back to life or be erased - It sounded so damn fake. It must have been a dream; there had been a cold going around, I probably got sick and fainted here. Details from my meeting with "the conductor" were already fading; just like a dream.

What I needed was something to eat; I guess I'd head to sunshine, it wasn't too far…I was at the West Exit Bus Terminal - wasn't I?

A bus revved its engine; somewhere, not too far from me. I was at the West Exit Bus Terminal.

Nearby a girl let out a muffled yet clearly high pitched laugh – "Oh man, now that's comedy!" – She was probably talking about me - lying on the floor like this?

I sat up, smirking; I guess it would look kinda funny; some kid wearing pretty much all Red sprawled out on the sidewalk. I stood up, ignoring the fact that I didn't feel tired. I stretched out and forced out a good long yawn.

"Yeah, some Sunshine sounds real good about now." I said wistfully before walking calmly in the fast food chains direction.

I didn't get very far before my phone vibrated and beeped in my pocket, probably someone asking where I was; explaining this would be fun.

It wasn't from anyone I knew.

"Set your frequency to 104.  
Duration = 3600 seconds.  
Those off key will be retuned."

Frequency, 104, 3600 seconds, off key…? Was this some kind of Viral marketing campaign infecting Shibuya?

"Ah" I shrugged, still walking "I'll Google it later"

Ok, Sunshine was in sight, right by Hachiko as always. Bounce in, bounce out; head home and make sure everything is alright.

My plan wasn't to last though, a piercing scream called out for my attention.

I ran towards the sound, turning around and seeing some guy, still screaming, getting hauled into nothingness was not a way I wanted to start my day.

I stood, stunned, and barely managed the slightest thought process. Was that 'the noise'? Had that guy just been erased? Was it going to 'erase' me?

Then my attention was called to my right; there was a wolf – no joke- a wolf smack bang in the centre of Shibuya. It growled at me, before launching itself towards me, bearing its large white fangs and slobbering just a little.

I closed my eyes. This was a dream. It was definitely a dream. It couldn't be real. No _fucking_ way was this real!

Real or not, the wolf didn't reach me. It had been hit by someone else, I think. Either way the thing was now looking at whoever had picked a fight with it. She was sort of tall, with half blue and half green hair – not too out there for Shibuya, was she part of my dream too? Her jeans were yellow and of the "Hip Snake" label; or so the legs of said garments claimed. Wait, can you read in dreams?

"Go," she said with a gentle and calm voice "Form a pact with someone; it isn't safe alone. A pact will let you fight the noise."

"There should be some players like you, confused, still in the scramble." She pointed in the direction of the Scramble Crossing; I looked at her; a thousand questions spinning in my head. I didn't get to ask any questions, however, as my arm was jumped onto by a small green frog.

The frog didn't stay long, and it jumped from my arm, ripping the cloth of my jumper and causing the slightest jet of blood to fire out of my body.

"Ahh!" I hissed, grasping my arm "…What the hell?!"

The frog leapt in for a second attack, before being smashed into the ground by what I can only describe as a flaming yo-yo.

"Yo!" the 'wielder' of the 'weapon' beamed at me "Listen to her; go form yourself a pact; we've got seven days to go! Let's not go messin' up on day one now or you'll never get your entry fee back!"

She scooped me from the ground and gave me a push in the general area of the Scramble.

Form a pact? 7 Days? Noise? Entry fee?

Oh God… it wasn't a dream… this game was real!

*********************************************************************************************

I don't know what struck me as weirder: the giant frog in the middle of Scramble Crossing or the guy that the frog was _chasing_. The guy was desperately yelling for someone to help him and out of the huge crowd nearby no one even batted an eye lid. It was as if they couldn't see him.  
Out of all the people on the Scramble not one seemed to notice this kid desperately shouting for help. His desperate shouting stopped. I looked around to see if I could see him again but he was gone. I don't know where he'd run off to or if Kermit was in hot pursuit but they were both gone. Oh well they were somebody else's problem now.

With great difficultly I lifted myself up from the concrete ground and shakily got to my feet. Give me a break; I'd only been dead for about a minute. To my surprise I realised there were a lot more people, some looked confused and even scared, that had obviously died too. Why did some of them look confused? 'The Conductor' had explained everything we needed to know. Having died, we were to take part in 'The Reaper's Game' – we were to put up our most precious possession, it didn't even have to be a physical object, as an entrance fee.

We were then faced with a challenge 'Survive seven days' after which we would be given the chance to return to life or replay the game for another week. Either that or we would face erasure. During this week we would be forced to pair up with another 'player' in order to fight the 'Noise' – a manifestation of negative emotions or something, I didn't really listen to that part. Shit, it only just dawned on me what that frog thing was.

"God I should have helped him..." I said aloud.

Had he been erased? Probably. Could I have helped him? Probably not. I would have had to form a pact with him without knowing a thing about him. Even so guilt-ridden thoughts ran through my mind. That guy would have had friends, a family, a whole life ahead of him and what had I done? I had stood by and watched while a monster by any other name had more than likely done him in. Fortunately for me my phone beeped to snap me out of my sulking – as did several phones nearby.

"You get mail when you're dead?" I wondered.

Oh yeah. The 'Mission Mail' thing the Conductor had told me about. Everyday a new mission would be issued to players by the Game Master apparently.

"So what's today's mission?" I asked my phone as I gently slid it open.

"Set your frequency to 104.  
Duration = 3600 seconds.  
Those off key will be retuned."

It gently replied via black and white text. What the…Oh, I get it. Frequ…Ouch! A sharp pain in my hand derailed my train of thought. A large 60:00 had appeared…I quickly noticed it was ticking down…so that was the 'duration'? Sixty minutes to complete the mission.

Several nearby yelps alerted me to other players. They also had some reactions to the Mail: not the same as mine but whatever, they obviously weren't as smart as me.

"What? That doesn't make any sense!" I heard one girl exclaim. Wrong.

"Oh crap!" some vulgar guy with a bald head replied "This tough on Day One? We're in trouble now!" Also wrong.

"This way!" yelled a girl in a short pink dress to a girl in black at her side. She was gesturing to her destination with a baseball bat clutched in one hand. The two took off towards Hachiko emitting slight giggles on their way. They were also wrong. Of course mob mentality ruled and about ten other people high-tailed it after them: cries of 'They know what to do!' and the like were abundant. I just watched in amazement. All twelve of them were running the wrong way without a second thought.

'Sheep…' I muttered as I quickly scanned the Scramble. I still needed to form a pact with someone in case any Noise came looking for lunch. Unfortunately I seemed to be completely screwed since no one replied to my shouts looking for a partner. That kid with the frog seemed a pretty attractive option right about now. Then again he must have been about twelve; I didn't want to rely on some kid to keep me alive for a week.

'Does anyone still need a partner!?' I yelled out as loud as I could. I figured it was safe to shout about such things because only other players would hear me; judging from their earlier response to the frog incident the large majority of people in Shibuya weren't playing the game. That and their phones hadn't gotten Mission Mail. Sadly no one replied to my shout. Everyone was gone.

Shit. Was I too late to form a pact? I couldn't have been. There had to be an even number of players otherwise this whole thing just wouldn't have been fair. Let's see. There were the two girls and their incorrect mission solution; the ten sheep who followed them. That was twelve. Then there was me: 15. And the kid with the frog chasing after him – 16. Shit.

There had been an even number of people but…one had been erased. And it was all my fault. The fear I'd felt lurking at the back of my mind, a direct result of my entrance fee no doubt, exploded and drowned out every other sense I had. This was it! I was a goner; there was definitely no way I could live to complete the mission! Judging by the reactions of the other players none of them could solve the mission in a million years let alone an hour. So thanks to me they were all going to be erased for failing the mission. Great.

And then, just as I was getting ready to die for the second time that day, a loud determined voice tore through the Scramble. He was desperately yelling something I couldn't quite make out. And then I heard that wonderful word; the word that snapped me out of my sulking session and allowed me to suppress the fear I was feeling all over my body.

"Anyone not made a pact?!" he yelled.

Thank God; someone else to make a pact with. There was no way I could let this kid get erased by Noise before I formed a pact with him.

Gathering all of my composure and forcing my almost shaking legs to move I began to walk towards him. He was a little bit younger looking than I would have liked but something about his roughed up exterior and blazing red…_motif _somehow inspired confidence despite his age. Well, that and he was the last box on the shelf.

"Anyone!?" he yelled, obviously terrified to his core.

I decided it would be best to calm him down first before I explained the mission to him. That and someone had to take the wheel and it would be better if it was someone I could trust: Me.

*********************************************************************************************

I was wheezing by the time I reached Scramble Crossing. Apparently running and dodging all that noise had taken its toll. I might even be too late to make a pact thing; the Scramble looked pretty deserted, apart from the crowds around me. Why hadn't they yelled at the noise? And not to mention - my mind was still in pieces. What had they taken as my fee? Maybe I didn't know it was gone!

"No!" I scolded aloud "Get one of these pact things first!"

"Hey!" I called "Anyone not made a pact?!"

Nothing; not a thing. No one even offered a 'No' in reply.

"ANYONE!?" I tried again; fear growing by the second.

"A pact?" asked a calming voice from the side "Please tell me if I heard you correctly.D Did you say you still haven't formed a pact? Don't you know that's the first thing you should do?" He raised a blond eyebrow at me and looked me up and down. "Or have you just woken up?"

He was young looking guy; probably my age…actually he looked a little older. He must have been older 'cause he was wearing a suit (which was probably as expensive as it looked – that would be very expensive), expensive shoes and a fancy watch. No kid could afford that.

"Yeah." I said, breath returning to me, "…You?"

"Me?" he asked, almost as if I was accusing him of something

"Formed a pact yet?" I asked him; trying not to sound too desperate.

"As a matter of fact…" he began, turning away from me and gazing at the oblivious crowd and folding his arms tight "No. No, I haven't."

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask why he hadn't – but I wanted to avoid pissing him off, which looked to be an easy job. He could have been my very last chance to make a pact.

His eyes were drawn to the area behind me; I spun round to get a look at whatever monster was there - a frog, well, four frogs.

The weird thing was that he didn't seem scared at all; in fact he might have been angry but I didn't really have time to judge his emotional state.

My arm stung at the cut I received earlier; a reminder that this really was my last chance.

"Form a pact with me, please! Make a pact with me and we'll win this thing! I promise!" I offered the guy my hand for a handshake; thinking that this was probably how pact making worked.

He blinked at me, winced maybe, before nodding his head towards me. He probably wasn't looking to pick up a 16 year old kid for this job; but it didn't take too long before my handshake was returned.

"I guess you'll have to do." he sighed "Just don't mess things up, ok?"

"No problem!" I said with a slight smirk, returning his nod.

Then the light show began.

It was a little startling, I'll admit. You don't usually see jets of light streaming in all directions; even more unusual are jets of light streaming in all directions after you just essentially bound your soul to a complete stranger, and then there were the four killer noise… frog things.

So this pact would let us fight the noise – but how? – By punching and kicking, that sort of thing? Where the hell was my flaming yo-yo?

"Hey!" I yelled at my new partner, who's name was still unknown to me "How do we fight these things?"

The guy across from me sighed before looking my way; where had he been looking anyway? 104? We hardly had time to shop; we were dead!

"Firstly." he said slowly; maybe he _hadn't_ noticed the frogs. "Firstly, we have to erase this noise; we could run, but I don't want them to follow us; it could be trouble."

He raised an eyebrow while eyeing my hoodie and the pins attached to it. One was from Tigre Punk and one from Mus Rattus. Why Tigre Punk? It was my favourite brand in Shibuya, so naturally I wanted to show my support. Why Mus Rattus? Long story.

"Secondly, many people use a single pin for psych based combat.

That being said, there are apparently a multitude of players who use multiple pins in combat with noise. Some can only use a certain type of pin – fire, water, earth, that sort of thing – while some can only use pins of a certain type – pins which shoot bullets, for one. I'm not sure how this is determined, but many pins are given out at the start of the game. You should try them out; or use one of the pins attached to your clothes, they might just work for you.

Anyway, no time like the present to get started, you can try it out on this noise."

He paused while he looked at me inquisitively "Got it?"

"Something about noise, badges, using badges to kill noise, got it." I said while I grinned at him.

Like ELS had saw; I had a Tigre Punk pin, named Velocity Attack and one named Blast Warning from Mus Rattus, I unpinned the Rattus-pin and faced the frogs. ELS did the same; I guess we were gonna split the frogs or something; it _was_ a partnership after all.

Mr Expensive-Looking-Stranger (ELS, for short) seemed to know what he was doing though; he would probably be able to answer a good few of my questions after this was over.

For now though, the frogs looked through with waiting.

"Here we go!" I said, half warning myself.

One of them leaped to my side, unusually fast for a frog, and attempted to bite me, I think. I dodged back, eyes never leaving my amphibious assailant. The frogs had split off into a group of two, probably instinct… or dividing up their 'meal'.

The frog leapt again, I dodged a second time, landing on my feet, right into the path of the second frog. It landed on my chest, possibly grinning at my stupidity before it dug in a claw. I let out a yell, punching it away from me with a bare fist. I held the fresh scratch through my shirt, it didn't feel so bad, but man it stung.

The frog, on the other hand, had no intention of being stopped by a basic punch, and immediately both frogs made a leap for me. I punched one away as it ducked, barely, out of the others path, managing to get about a metre in a safe direction.

"Hey!" yelled my partner "Use your pins you idiot, otherwise they wont stop!"

Oh. Right. The pin in my hand. I just had to…make it kill two frog monsters. Easy.

I pointed it in the direction of the closer of the two frogs; if something did happen I wanted a hit, not a miss.

"Here goes…" I said, looking in the frog in the eyes "Take this!"

Nothing happened. Talk about embarrassing.

"Focus!" ELS shouted over "Focus on WHERE you want it to hit, not WHAT!"

Oh, of course. Why hadn't I thought of that - where, not what. It was all so clear now.

The frogs edged closer, I dodged again.

"Here goes…" I said again as I looked at the ground beneath the frog, feeling a tad more foolish than last time "Take this!"

The hand the pin was in heating up; the pin in question felt like the epicentre of the heat. My gaze, however, was glued to the frog I had once pegged as a severe threat. It was on fire, and I mean it was covered in the stuff, hopping away was doing it no good, as long as my eyes were focused near the frog it seemed that the fire would follow. A few seconds passed and the frog _burst, _or something.

I was stunned; I did _that?!_ The second frog seemed to get the message, and had taken my amazement as an opening, leaping at me once more, aiming for the face it seemed. I jumped back, creating enough distance for the frog to land on the ground at my feet, looking up at me.

I locked eyes with it, the fire following my vision. The frog was slapped back a few feet from the force of the fire.

The fire chased, the frog inhaled, blowing out bubbles of water, which seemed to douse the flames. Uh oh. I aimed again, the fire twisting along the ground, before going out seemingly of its own accord.

My back was to a wall. I wouldn't be able to dodge in time if the frog leapt again, which it did. It happened in slow motion. I breathed my final few breaths, the frog croaked, then jumped at my face and then my partner appeared, in just enough time to slam the beast full force into the wall beside me – without using his hands either, causing it to do that bursting thing the other one did.

What remained in its place was a small pin like the ones I had attached to me, ELS pocketed it and sighed, "Markets closed."

"Come on" he said, walking in the direction of 104 "we don't have much time left"

"Much time left for _what?!"_ I yelled, running slightly to keep up – he was already a good distance away "Wait up; I've got some questions to ask!"

He stopped. "Questions? Like what?"

"Well… why did my fire stop like that? What was that pin you picked up? What happened to those frogs?" I said "and why 104?"

"Hmm" said ELS "I'll explain when we finish the mission. Anything else? Anything that _isn't _about the game?"

"Well" I started "If we're in this together we should at least try and by friends, so…What's your name?"

He looked taken aback, possibly appalled to be friends with someone of my appearance (that's "rough" – not "poor"), but taken aback or not, he answered.

"My name is Suttoku Kurasha, but I guess you can call me Stock."

"Great!" I smiled at him "The names Tadashi Bushi, pleased to meet you, Stock."

************************************************************************************************************

My younger partner seemed to have the right amount of spirit about him but I was beginning to fear he lacked, rather severely, in the attention span side of life. Well I might be wrong about that, he hadn't spoken about anything non-game related since I'd met him, but then again if he had been paying attention he would know all this from his chat with the composer. Sadly for me, and him I suppose, _Tadashi _was far too wound up in the confusion of it all – sucks to be him. Of all the people in Shibuya I had to wind up with the dumbest.

"So why are we heading to 104 anyway?" he repeated. He probably chose to believe that I hadn't heard the first two times. Eventually ignoring him and calmly walking to the department store became too much to bear and I caved in.

"Okay, if I tell you will you stop dragging your heels and move?" I asked.

"Sure." he replied, grin firmly in place…at least I imagine it was – it was in front of him at this point and had no intention of slowing down to pass the time of day. Speaking of the time…crap!

"No time! Move your ass!" I yelled back to him. Forgetting the fact that I might be seen by other players I forced my legs to move as fast as I possibly could. I could practically hear the timer on my palm ticking down. How could we have lost track of time so badly? We'd spent the best part of the hour doing nothing but fighting a few frogs!

"Wait up!" Tadashi yelled after me. I was so far in front that I only vaguely heard him. "Hey slow down!" He shouted again; a desperate, almost scared tone in his young voice.

I probably should have waited for him or at least shouted back an explanation but something was driving me on, willing me to continue. The prospect of slowing down was something that made me feel sick to think about; but it wasn't a feeling of fear or anything like that, not really. The real thing driving me on was, in actual fact, my utter surprise at how quick and agile I suddenly found myself. I hadn't even noticed it until that point; after two years of intensive hospital treatment I was able to run like I used to! My lungs were on fire! My heart was pounding so hard I could feel it in my teeth! And my hair was blowing in the wind; I had hair! God, I couldn't stop smiling when I realised that I had hair again! What a weird site it must have been for that guy in the red hooded shirt, not Tadashi, to see a player hurtling towards the mission goal with seconds to go, 45 seconds to be exact, with a huge smile on their face. It was wiped of my face when I ran smile-first into a force field or something.

"Ow!" I yelped. I felt myself being forced back, away from whatever was in front of me. I assumed it was something to do with the mission; maybe it was to keep the noise out. I didn't even realise I was rubbing my cheek vigorously. That _thing_ had stung my face. "What the hell is this thing?" I asked the guy with the hooded shirt. Before he could answer another idiot with a hooded shirt ran straight into my back sending me flying forward and forcing my face into another not-so-romantic kiss with the invisible-wall. Only this time I wasn't sent flying back because the Crimson-Crusader was lying firmly against my back forcing me forward thus counteracting the repelling wall. How undignified.

"Pact confirmed. Wall Cleared" said the guy next to us.

Wait what? Wall cleared? No wait!

It was too late, I felt my legs buckle from under me and, for the second time today, my face was introduced to the hard, dirty ground of Shibuya. How undignified. But no, it didn't end there because before I could get up myself I felt myself being lifted from the ground by my shirt collar. I assumed it was my oh-so-helpful partner who was evidently trying to erase me himself, and I was right. Half gasping for air, half gurgling like an idiot I regained my composure. How completely and utterly undignified.

"You had a nasty fall there." he said.

Idiot, you're the one who practically sat on me!

"I guess I did." I muttered dusting myself off. I noticed, amongst a few slight scrapes, that the timer had disappeared from my hand. "I guess we cleared the mission."

"We did?" asked Tadashi. His face bore a look of utter confusion. Oh my…don't tell me he didn't…but he…

"Do you even know what the mission was?" I asked him as politely as I could.

"Well…" he paused to think. I mean, judging by his wrinkled forehead he was putting in some serious effort. "It was obviously to get rid of that wall, right?" he concluded. I suppose it would have been a reasonable conclusion; that is if it hadn't been the wrong one.

But he was smiling at me so I decided to pull my punches. "Not quite, but close. The mission was, as I hope you remember, 'Set your frequency to 104. Duration = 3600 seconds. Those off key will be retuned,' right?" He nodded. "Well our frequency is obviously our location and 104 is here." I pointed to the ground below us where I'd been not moments prior. "3600 seconds is one hour and duration…well I'm sure you knew that one at least. But the last bit is sort of confusing I suppose; I was told if we failed missions that we would be erased but this is part…'retuned,' it's sort of…"

"Stupid?"

Well…he put it better than I could have, I suppose. "Yeah, it's stupid…"

"So what happens now?" he asked.

"I don't know…the Conductor never mentioned the time between missions. Maybe we'll get another mission in a few minutes…" I trailed off, there was some weird noise coming from nearby, and it wasn't that kind of Noise. "Hey, can you hear that?" His scarlet head was nodding to the beat of what I eventually identified as music. "I guess so…"

"It's got a good beat to it, don't you think?" he asked me. Finally, he asked a question that wasn't about the Reaper's Game! But now I had to answer it…

"I guess it's okay. Not really my style I suppose!" I found myself shouting to be heard over the music; its volume was steadily increasing.

"What!?" Tadashi yelled. Did he seriously not notice the extreme leap in volume?

"Let's crank this baby all the way up to eleven!" yelled someone nearby. His voice was deep and confident. I turned to see who it was and was met by an unexpected sight.

Directly opposite us there was a giant amp almost taller than myself with some lunatic standing on top of it. In the middle of a busy city no less. The lunatic in question was dressed top-to-tail in classic punk clothing. A t-shirt that looked like its pattern had ran when washed; a tight pair of trousers with chains and belts attached to every conceivable location and a black, unzipped, parka with a fur-lined hood. Oh and he also had, what appeared to be, a solid gold guitar clasped in his hands which, in tandem with the amplifier, he was causing enough noise to deafen everyone in the area. Of course that applied to players only because no one else was clasping their hands to their ears in a desperate attempt to shut the damn song out. Well, Tadashi wasn't – he was clapping and cheering. "He must be slow." I thought to myself.

Finally, after three and half excruciating minutes, the song finished with a booming crescendo.

"**Sometimes I need someone to hold me tight! Explain to me what is justice, what is right!?"** boomed out the confident voice – how he was amplifying his voice I don't know but he was. And rapidly silence once again descended on the Reaper's Shibuya. The lunatic jumped off of the amp and jogged over to us. "Sup?" he asked with a beaming smile.

"That was awesome!" yelled Tadashi. Whether he was speaking loud from deafness or from a lack of consideration for others who knows…I guess it could have been excitement, but really…

"Thanks, kid!" replied the unnamed wannabe-rock star. "What'd you think?" he asked turning to me.

"It was kind of loud, wouldn't you say?" I asked. Stock used Veiled Insult!

"Heh, that was kinda the point." But it failed!

"Well then I guess it was perfect." I kindly replied.

"Thanks, it means a lot when your fans say these things." he said as he compressed his guitar into thin air. I could see a golden pin in his hand with a guitar burned into it. "So are you guys the only two left or something?" he asked "First day, I tried to be easy going. Keep in touch with the old classics, you know?"

"Oh, I know what you mean!" Tadashi chimed in. I wondered if he knew who this guy was. "It's like when your favourite band plays their old stuff and no one seems to appreciate it but their true fans." he said with a sage nod. Oh dear, he clearly didn't know what this guy meant.

"Yeah man!" cheered the stranger who was more-than-likely-the-GM. "You two totally get it!" he was grinning like the cat that got the pigeon. What a freak.

"What's your name?" I asked, getting straight to the point. He grinned and pulled something smooth and black from his pocket. He aimed the object at my chest and began to wave it around like a man possessed. At first I thought was going to stab me before I realised he was, in all honesty, signing my shirt.

"The name's Oreguro Enko, but you can call me Allegro." he said placing the cap back on his marker. I looked down to see a generic black stain; he hadn't signed it at all! It was all for show!

"Anyway I best head back…so like, congrats and stuff, I guess." he said - while he compressed the oversized amp he had with him into a pin as well.  
"I better see you guys at tomorrow's show!" he shouted before taking off towards the Station.

Like I said: 'What a freak.'

"See, I liked him." Tadashi replied with a stretch.

What an idiot. It was probably common knowledge that players like us were not supposed to like the GM. Then again looking at him it was a wonder Tadashi knew who he was let alone who the GM was. "That was the GM." I replied as I walked towards 104. I was looking forward to a quick look around the Department Store for the first time in a long time. Unfortunately just after Tadashi burst out with an exaggerated, but at the same time somehow normal, 'What!?' my vision slipped into blackness.

It felt like Dying, again.

*********************************************************************************************************

"Eight players wiped out on the first day…" hummed Hiraku. "And by fellow players no less. They could put some of our reapers to shame…" He raised an eyebrow towards his present company as if asking for an opinion. He wasn't given one. "This action is indeed a side effect brought on by the collection of the attacking players respective entry fees." He continued "However as these two were able to prove in last week's game; they are more than capable of reaching day seven and may prove to be a problem to the other players. In the interest of fairness I fe-"

"Abureke Sachi and Haruka Mizuki…" The Composer said, cutting of Hiraku. "If they make it to the end of this week then they shall be erased for their conduct this day. Their actions have been deplorable and will not be tolerated."

"Understood."

"As for our GM…" Asked the Composer. The ruler of the Underground was currently captivated by a rather large fish in the aquarium on Dead God's Pad floor but was listening intently. "There is certainly something unusual about him, wouldn't you say so?" This time it was the Composer who raised an eyebrow, demanding an answer.

The Conductor replied with nervous laughter. "There is something…_unique_ about all of our Game Masters. Perhaps their unique features are enough to ensure they make it to the top? Why I'm sure you will remember the young girl with a passion for traffic laws. My word, wasn't that was an unusual week…"

"I remember" the Composer smiled graciously. "But you contradicted yourself. Indeed she was an odd ball but as _you _pointed out 'that was an unusual week'. Just one week. Not two or even three."

"I see…" Hiraku smiled back, defeated. "Then what about that old fellow with the sweet-tooth? He ran the show with an iron fist."

"Indeed he did. But he met a rather _sticky _end if I remember rightly."

"Ouch…cut me some slack here, Seiko." grinned the Conductor. "In either case both GMs were fully capable of managing at least one game before their erasure. In the end is that not all that matters?"

"I suppose…" replied the Composer before focusing 100% on a bloated useless looking fish within the thick tank.

The Conductor also turned his attention to this single ineffective creature and smiled for, by achieving such a size, the poor creature had gone and made itself a target for any predators lurking in the tank.

**- I am not what I am. -**

Authors' Notes:

**Vyce here**; I will be writing half of this fan fiction; I am responsible for writing the majority of Stock's scenes and I hope you enjoyed them.  
While The World Ends With You is a fantastic game I feel there are so many opportunities that were missed and so many concepts left unexplained in the canon. As a result this fan fiction will change some concepts slightly and will use fanon to explain things that the game left unexplained (How did Neku turn yen pins into actual yen for example?)  
And a lot of other fan fiction just seems to put Neku and the gang back in the game. While I have no doubt that this could be pulled of; we've seen it all before. And neither of them would be the confused little kids they were the first time come to that. That is why this story contains no canon characters; the Composer at the end wasn't even Joshua. And it wasn't Stock's mother who lost her memory and sight after she was shot in a tragic magic trick accident and left to live in the Borginian countryside Shibuya Underground.

It also contains no super powered half-angels–half-daemon-half-Taboo Noise decked out in the latest gear from SparklyPoo Boutique. Oh no! Only quality characters will make an appearance in this story I assure you!  
And that 'Allegro signing Stock's shirt' thing; I forgot Prince did the same kind of thing to Neku in Another Day; but this is a different thing – Allegro is imitating people like Prince, so it works.

**Wraith**; My brother in keyboards said pretty much all there was to say so far, so instead of a long winded note from me you can go read his again.  
I write most of Tadashi's scenes. Yay.  
I hope you liked it the first chapter.  
I hope you stick with us until the end; or at least give us a shot!  
I really hope to see all of you in day 2, people!

* * *


	2. Day 2: Extinction

**Disclaimer: **We do not own The World Ends With You – Well, we own a copy of the game each, but we don't own the rights to it.

* * *

Blackness had engulfed me and my red clothed partner shortly after we had _that _conversation. Not that I minded the interruption; it saved going into any details about my own family or personal situation; and it prevented any further questions from Tadashi.

It was just a little bit alarming, that's all. Everything going dark one minute; in broad daylight in front of 104; then waking up who knows where. Fortunately someone did know where we were;

"How did we get to the Udagawa Back Streets?" Yawned my partner "Weren't we just at 104? "

See? I guess he was good for something; he seemed to know Shibuya pretty well, that could come in handy, I guess. Probably. Possibly. Maybe.

"We were just at 104, yeah" I said "And this is the second day. No mission yet, I guess we wait for it" That's all I needed – being forced to wait to be forced to take part in a game of life or death. Talk about unprofessional.

"Well then, let's take a stroll to Tipsy Tose Hall; it's near the centre of the City – it should be easier to get to the mission from there."

Unless the mission takes place _here _that is. Oh well, there was no mission yet; I guess I could go along with his idea, for now anyway.

"Let's go then" I said, ushering him down the steps and into the vicinity of Shibu-Q Heads "And let's stick together, just in case"

Tadashi didn't finish listening, however. He tore ahead of me within seconds – seriously, where was the off switch on that kid? Keeping an eye on him wasn't easy – I had to run to keep up myself – the familiar sense of joy and euphoria the action installed within me returning – man it was good to be alive again! Or dead; technically.  
Either way I managed to catch up pretty easily; him about a metre ahead, if it was a race I wouldn't count myself out quite yet. If I hadn't been too busy enjoying the feeling of a fully functioning – and then some – body, I might have heard my phone beep. Mission mail was here.

Tadashi himself, now in front of the store, _had_ heard the noise and had decided to stop dead in his tracks; while I was still running fairly close behind him. Move out of the way you idiot!

My nose met the back of his head, full force too. Blood sprayed out, like you'd see from a guy in a Shoujo anime – only this was from head butting the back of someone's head – not from catching a girl mid-changing. The former is by far the least fun of the two. The blood got on the front of my suit, annoyance 1.

My nose was bleeding a fair bit - annoyance 2.

It hurt like hell - annoyance 3.

Some blood had gotten on Tadashi – ok that made me feel a little bit better.

He was wearing all red so you couldn't tell - annoyance 4.

"Ah!" he said, rubbing the back of his head "What happened, you trip or something?"

No, an idiot stopped running right in front of me! "Yeah, something like that" I glowered at him.

"Anyway, you should be more careful"

It was on the tip of my tongue to inform him that my current condition was all his fault – but the blood was getting annoying and I needed something to wipe it away – oh, that and the timer had arrived.

"Ouch!" I said quietly as possible, fortunately for me Mr Loud Mouth yelled out over the top of things

"Damn it; that hurts! Why does it have to be so damn sore?"

"Probably so that no idiots forget all about it" I said; reminding him of yesterday "Now come on; I need something for this blood; and my nose is sore" No thanks to you.

I lead the way to the Nishimura place; if anything as going to get rid of this pain I wanted it to be the best.

"Nishimura Drugs? That place is expensive, man!"

"It'll be fine, get moving."

* * *

When we got inside the place and had arrived and the pharmacy; I took this opportunity to stare blankly around the room – I wasn't too good with stuff like this; pharmaceuticals and that stuff. Stock, on the other hand, had engaged the doctor in conversation. They exchanged brief formalities before Stock asked for a few specific things; which were put into a bag from under the counter. He glanced my way and directed me to move with his head. I did.

The doctor lead both of us to a shelf stocked up with pain killers and said some more stuff. She explained the dosage; ingredients and all that jazz to Stock, who looked like he understood every word. Maybe he was a doctor before this whole thing, 'cause he knew his stuff and he was asking some very specific questions. He took a packet of pills and handed them to the doctor; she took his products to the till and let him pay for the stuff. Well, she made him pay, she wasn't about to give him the choice. Oh well.

"Come on" he said to me, using a new handkerchief to wipe the blood off of his face "Lets get going"

"Right behind you" I told him.

"Come again soon!" the doctor called after us.

Stock waved over his shoulder, like a friend.

We were outside again; and then it clicked. The people in that place had a lot more vibrancy and colour to them; and they could _see_ us; or the doctor could anyway!

"Whoa, man, they could _see_ us in there." I told him; expecting surprise as his reaction.

"So what?" - Apathy? Talk about disappointing.

"So _this!" _I said, sticking my hand out in front of a bystander, waving it wildly "See? No reaction; out here we're invisible; but in there we're visible!"

He sighed out loud; more apathy. "Yeah, that's because of the Player Decal on the wall; the Conductor told us about it – you probably weren't paying attention. Basically it means we become visible in there and can be seen; it's like we're alive again."

I nodded, understanding what he meant (though his in depth explanations helped a fair bit.

After he had cleaned his nose and taken pills for the pain (it didn't look _that_ bad)

he looked over at me and spoke.

"Did we get a mission before we went in?"

"Yeah"

"…How long were we in there?"

"I dunno, about ten, twenty minutes?"

His hand shot out of his pocket, his eyes fixated on his palm; there it was. A timer as clear as day – had either of us even read the mail? I almost read it but Stock had hit me!

"What the hell?" he asked "4 and a half… we have over 4 hours to get this done… what does the mail say?"

I flipped my own phone out; noting the desperation in his voice – he was worrying too much, like he said – 4 hours. No sweat!

"Venue = Molco

Two Beat Pattern.

Find D and B or Get Erased

Duration = 18,000 seconds

Those off key will be retuned"

I read out to him.

"Right; well; I guess we should go to Molco first; I don't understand much else – maybe it meant to say "D+B" not "D and B"? That should become clear at Molco; so let's head there. And _don't _run off ahead this time. "

I cringed slightly; but didn't apologise, he didn't look like he'd accept it anyway.

"To Molco then; this way, we can cut through Spain Hill"

Molco wasn't all that busy today -well, relative to the rest of Shibuya – but I couldn't see any other players, maybe because of the time we spent in the pharmacy.

I mused to myself about the mission, walking calmly; unlike Stock who looked like he was hurrying – he probably wanted to get the mission solved as soon as he could – a load of his mind I guessed, so I picked up the pace myself.

There was a guy with a red hoodie on standing by the entrance to Spain Hill – the quickest path to Molco – he looked at us as we approached – I mean his gaze followed us; like, he could see us. Was he one of the Reapers?

Stock stopped moving – which I didn't notice; due to my new quickened step I had walked past him. I kept moving and walked face first into some pain.

It felt like I had been repelled from whatever I'd hit; a force field?

"I knew it" came the calm voice from behind me "It's one of those force fields"

Hey, I was right!

"Hey players" said the guy in red; he must have been a Reaper then "Want me to clear this wall? Then erase the noise possessing anyone in this area."

* * *

Noise was possessing people? How does that even work? How could we tell who was possessed; by talking to them? Were they in a store somewhere? Was there a player decal nearby? I would have asked the reaper – but something told me he wouldn't lend us any aid.

"Hey; how can we tell who's possessed by noise?" Tadashi asked. Idiot; like that would work.

The reaper didn't respond. Tadashi asked again.

"Hey! How can we tell who's possessed, don't ignore me damn it!"

The reaper turned his head to face Tadashi and answered.

"Scan the area." He said slowly.

"Thanks, man, back soon!"

Don't thank him you moron; he didn't even want to help us!

Tadashi ran out to the middle of the street, possibly to get a wide view of the area; or maybe he just felt like it, it was hard to tell with this guy.

Wait; did he even know how to scan?! He hardly remembered his meeting with the Conductor. He really was an idiot, wasn't he?

I followed; being close enough to see him put his hands to his ears, as if he was concentrating; an almost serene look taking hold of his usually naïve face and he was talking to himself; well, muttering to himself anyway – I decided to get closer without speaking to him – I didn't want to interrupt whatever this was.

Turns out he was muttering "No" to himself – not the kind of no you say when something goes wrong – the kind you say when you're looking for something. What was he looking for anyway?

"Hey..." I said softly, not wanting to wreck his concentration "…what are you d-"

"Found it!!!" the crimson-concentrator yelled, which – I hate to admit – gave me an _ever so slight_ fright.

"You've got what?" I asked, looking around for whatever he had found

He turned his head to look at me, and raised an eyebrow  
"Well, you know how some noise looks bigger than others? And some look smaller? Well, this noise isn't red like the usual noise – it's _orange_, see?"

Bartender? I'll have whatever he's drinking.

"And then there's the fact that the noise isn't floating around the place; it's almost inside her thoughts!"

Bartender? Make it a double.

"Mind explaining that? In Japanese, if you don't mind" I asked.

"Huh? You still don't get it?" he said, sighing – he sighed at me! – "Hmm, it'd be easier if you told me what you didn't get…"

Good Lord, now I was going to have to admit that I didn't understand a thing he said. Great.

"Well… I guess I'll just explain it all, just to be sure, okay? Listen up!"

He sat down, on the ground, and pulled me with him. Hey! Not so rough!

"Well… ok. First, you know how when you scan the area and you see noise floating around the place?"

"Scan the area?"  
"Yeah, when you activate your little black pin thing – that's called scanning the area, see?"  
I frowned. How did he know that? "How do you know that?"

"I scanned the area yesterday when you weren't talking – you haven't tried it?"

"Evidently not" I said – stating the obvious.

We spoke about the scanning thing for a bit before he suggested I try it.

"Find your own way to concentrate… its sort of hard to activate the pin. Feels like you need to put your mind at ease, so it's hard to do if you're panicking. When you're completely peaceful that's when you trigger the pin!  
You'll be able to hear people's thoughts and see noise floating around, but it won't attack you, I guess we have to attack it first, maybe the pact stops fights. Anyway; when you're scanning, take a look at the size and colour of the noise – then look at that girl over there and you'll see what I was talking about."

How the hell did he work that out? The guy was an idiot! Why hadn't he mentioned it before?!

"Well?" he asked "you going to try?"

"Got it, calm down" I sighed and stood up again.

The "little black pin" as my young partner had called it – the "player pin" as it was known – lay in my palm, it was slightly cold, it emitted a strange feeling, probably due to its association with the game.  
Ok… mind at ease… mind at ease.

…  
…

Think calming thoughts… before this game… before I died…

My mind felt strange, it was washed over – almost like an outer body experience. Visions of a hospital room rushed by like images in a paper flip book;

_I was in a Doctor's office, then a surgery, in my house; father talking, I wasn't listening, in my bathroom; seeing myself in front of the mirror, eyes heavy, skin pale and sickly, in a hospital bed, constant beeping in the background, breath tightening, the intervals in beeping stopped. This was when it had happened, why was I seeing this!?_

A tremendous force knocked me off of my feet, onto my back on the stone ground. Tadashi stood over the top of me; his hand outstretched – offering me support.

"Sorry" he said "something happened – you freaked, screamed a bit, I just tried to snap you out of it"  
I took his hand. I had screamed? What the hell was that? Wait, he hit me!  
I took his hand anyway; shit, I was trembling, my breath was heavy, and beads of sweat dripped down my face, and were those tears in my eyes? I wiped them away; just in case.

Tadashi pulled me to my feet, making sure I could stand properly. "So… what happened? You want to try again?"  
Fortunately it seemed he wasn't looking for an answer to the first question – It wouldn't have mattered, I had no answers to give him.

We sat for a few minutes, Tadashi said he wanted to rest – it was obvious he wanted _me_ to rest, too obvious for me to draw attention to. I managed to calm down, thankfully, and decided to try the scanning thing again – apparently focusing on the time when I was still alive wouldn't calm me down at all.

I closed my eyes. Ok…calm again, calm down. Don't think about life. Think back… did I have anything to think about that didn't involve my old life? Then it hit me, yesterday. The first time I entered the game. I had met up with Tadashi and found myself running to 104, running for my life. I had ran; like a normal person, legs trembling afterward, lungs burning, face flushed. It had been such a rush, it had thrown out all my worries, and I didn't have to worry about anything while I was in this place, not a thing.

The feeling of the player pin in my hand had changed; it no longer felt cold foreign to me, it felt like it was a part of my very being, like it belonged with me. I opened my eyes and held back a gasp; taken aback at the sight. The surrounding area was now covered in floating… things, large and small jagged red _things. _They must have been the noise Tadashi mentioned, there were people walking around. There was a blue aura around everyone in the vicinity. Nearby there was a guy in the crowd. I looked at the aura around him, focusing my attention; through the silence around me I heard the guy's voice;

_**"I sure hope I get that big promotion; but I don't deserve it? Do it? Maybe I do… no, I don't."**_

I gasped; these were his thoughts! I could read his mind like this… just like Tadashi had told me. Oh! Right! He said to look for a girl somewhere; forget about the guy with the inferiority complex, I had to find her.

I looked around for her, and there she was – a young girl dressed quite normally, for Shibuya anyway– standing there, the same aura surrounding her as the other guy; only it was a neon orange colour, complete with neon orange noise. It stood out in the crowd, that's for sure; the only orange colour in a sea of blue and red.  
I focused my attention on her, trying not to attract the attention of the noise which was _inside_ her aura, zipping around.

_**"Should I? Shouldn't I? Yes, I should… but no… I don't know what the right thing to do is"**_ her sweet voice sang. Hardly helpful, was it?

I snapped out of the scan-induced-trance, Tadashi also scanning beside me – he turned to face me almost immediately after I stopped scanning, a smile on his face.

"You did it!" he beamed "And did you see he girl? I guess she's possessed, huh? So we have to take out that noise, that's all?"  
"Yeah" I said – had he worked this all out on his own? Maybe I had been wrong about with him being a _complete_ idiot. Or maybe it was because he was a curious idiot that he triggered the pin… who knows?

"Why don't you do the honours?" he asked me, interrupting my thoughts.

"And how exactly would I do that, Dr Scan?"  
He smiled at the nickname. No! It wasn't a compliment you moron! It was sarcasm, don't you understand!

"I figured you would focus on the noise and they'd just come towards you, like activating a pin's effect"  
"Psych, it's called a pin's 'psych'" I said, correcting him. God it was petty on reflection, thankfully he seemed pretty happy I had told him this.

"Ok then, it's like activating a psych! Go, try it! Let's get that noise!"

I scanned, again thinking of my first day in the game to calm me down, and focused on the noise – there was just one of them inside the orange aura; it wasn't very big; it should be easy to take out. I focused on it and the symbol seemed to respond – it flew towards our location and faded out of vision – like it had used an invisibility cloak - various noise creatures materialised around us, presumably they came from the, now vanished, jagged object I had attracted. There were 4 creatures; a wolf and 3 frogs. The frogs looked easy, but the wolf could be trouble. A frog jumped at Tadashi, he made a slight noise of fright and disgust and dodged to the side

"Ill deal with the wolf" he said "I wanna practice using my pins a little more, I don't really like frogs; and besides, you beat them so easily the other day."

He had a point, and I didn't mind if he wanted to fight the wolf, at least it meant I didn't risk being torn up under its sharp teeth.

"Sure" I nodded "just don't get yourself erased, and don't take too long, timer's ticking."

With a brief nod he charged into battle with the wolf, leaving me to stare down 3 frogs, none of them looking particularly friendly.

* * *

I slammed the wolf with my fist, forgetting that, without a pin or anything like that, it wouldn't do much good. I leapt over it, dodging its claw. It growled at me.

Ok, think – how do you beat a wolf made from negative emotions? Cheer it up maybe? Rub its tummy? Give it a dog treat?  
Well, aside from jokes, my only option was pins - like the fire one I used yesterday. I focused on the ground at my feet, fire trailed along – aiming for the noise ahead of me, it managed to dodge easily before rushing at me– tackling me to the ground, without biting me, thankfully. It slid as it landed, making deep scratches in the ground with its claws. I jumped back to my feet; no way in hell did I want that thing to land on top of me.  
Note to self; do not get bitten or clawed.

I made my fire turn round and chase the wolf, again, it dodged, again and it tackled me to the ground, again. Why the hell was my trail of fire moving so slowly? Damn it. I managed to stand back up, my arms scratched and scraped under my sleeves. Come to think of it, the cut from yesterday was gone; was that a rule in the game? Oh well, I'd ask Stock later.

Time to try something new; obviously I wasn't able to make the fire catch this thing; it was just moving way too fast for that.

I made the fire chase the predator for a final time. It converged on the wolf to strike, the wolf dodged, just like I expected! I pulled back the fire, focusing as hard as possible on the, now slobbering and charging, animal coming at me. The fire was about to catch it but it died out, without a warning and without even a sound, it just stopped, was the pin broken or something?! Oh, right, the wolf – it was still coming right at me, wasn't it? I barley managed to dodge out the way, my hoodie receiving a tear in its sleeve fabric, and landed unskilfully on my front; a good metre from the wolf

"Get back on your feet!" Stock yelled from somewhere in the distance.  
"Not a problem." I wanted to say – but I had knocked the air out of myself when I landed like that.

I hopped back up. Ok, the fire pin had lost its colourful design and was now grey… well; it was two colours, two shades of grey, light grey was filling up the dark grey like a pie chart. Was that a hologram? It wouldn't even make fire anymore! That was my only way of attacking! What was I supposed to do now?

Probably sensing my trouble Stock yelled over "Try using your _other_ pin, you had two, remember!"

Oh yeah, my Tigre Punk pin… Velocity Attack. I Held it in my fist, the wolf running at me, a sick grin had formed on its drooling mouth, oh well; it wouldn't be smiling for long!  
I pulled my fist back, closed my eyes and plunged my fist at the wolf. The force was _insane_. My entire left arm moved at an incredible speed, fist connecting to the wolf, I heard its bones make a sickening crack; it howled and was sent spiralling backwards, onto the stone ground before it disappeared into what looked like dust – had my one hit been _that_ strong?

My left arm fell to a limp position and was in huge pain, I gripped it to support it, but that only made it worse. I screamed out, causing Stock to look over. He was dealing with those frogs; only one of them was left. I looked down at my arm; I couldn't move it or anything like that.  
While managing to skilfully dodge a flying leap from the final frog he was engaged with Stock gave me a nod of acknowledgement. I could practically hear him say "I'll be with ya in two seconds." Only he wouldn't say it like that. I leaned against the closest wall and watched my partner; it seemed like a good idea to familiarise myself with his fighting style, in case we ever needed to fight the same thing with each other.

Judging from what I was seeing…that insanely high leap from the frog wasn't a leap at all. It looked like Stock was the one causing it. I mean it had to be 'cause whenever that thing got near him he'd just thrust his arm towards it and send the pathetic creature spiralling through the air. I watched in amazement as he toyed with the creature like it was nothing. Despite how tough the fight was for him he made it look so easy. With a quick thrust of his right arm he sent the beast hurtling into the air. His hand plunged down; the frog followed. A sickening croak bubbled up from a sizeable hole in street. From this distance it looked like Stock was actually enjoying himself because he was definitely grinning. He began to walk towards me, completely turning his back on the frog…well he had turned his back on it but he threw his right hand into the sky and sent the dying noise into orbit with one hand. "Sorry about that." He said as he ran up next to me. The frog hit the ground directly in front of him with a hard slapping sound and burst into that weird dust with a faint gurgling sound. I prepared to get to my feet; the battle was over, after all.

"Don't move" he said, taking off his fancy suit jacket, too hot after all that fighting, probably.

He went on, while fooling around with the jacket, to ask me a bunch of questions; where did it hurt? Exactly what happened, could I move it at all, etc.

I answered his questions, causing him to sigh.

"It's dislocated - your shoulder I mean."

"And how long does that take to get better?" I asked  
"About 12 weeks if it's dislocated, about 6 weeks if its only a separated shoulder, after medical treatment. I'm not a trained doctor so I couldn't say what's up with your arm; at best you could hope that it was just separated."

"What!? We don't have that amount of time! I need to be able to use my arm now! Can't you pop it back into place?"  
"Well, I could. But the pain could knock you out, and we could fail the mission, I'm not too keen on that idea. The shoulder is the only thing that can be dislocated because of the way the joint is positioned in the body. Not to mention that it would get worse if it was done wrong. Just relax; the UG seems to heal injuries, for instance; your arm isn't cut anymore, is it?"

"I noticed that too… so what do we do then? And how did it get dislocated in the first place?"

"Well, firstly; I'll put your arm in a sling, made from my own jacket by the way, although it should be made from _your _clothes. Secondly; you said you moved your arm at an extreme speed, right? – That speed probably moved your arm far too quickly from your body, creating the effect of a hard fall, dislocating your shoulder."

"Wow! How do you know all this?" I asked in awe "Are you training to be a doctor?"

He twitched, barely – but I noticed it.

"Or maybe you have a doctor in the family? Did you spend a lot of time in the hospital because of that?"

"Look, that isn't any of _your_ damn business, ok!?" He snapped "And I don't have the answers to your endless questions, I am _not_ some kind of internet search engine!"

I really hadn't expected him to take such a drastic change in emotion, and I barely noticed the tears forming at the corner of his eyes while he put the makeshift sling around my arm, but I did notice it, I just didn't say anything about it.

"Take these," he said, handing me some pills and water "It's for the pain."

He checked the timer on his hand without a sound. I checked my own – 3 hours 45 minutes – or 'who cares how many seconds'.

We walked over to the red-hooded reaper, "Objective met, wall cleared" he said before handing Stock a pin and taking off.

Stock took off to Spain Hill at a sharp pace.

* * *

I walked quickly, still half mad at Tadashi's question – well, more so scared than mad, why did he have to ask about back then? Gah, what a moron! What was his problem? Had he never heard of privacy? Even after I'd given him my jacket too!

The tears in my eyes had managed to drip down, why was I crying over this?  
None of this was fair! I was nearly running now; forgetting all about Tadashi who must have been struggling to keep up, especially after falling over multiple times and wrecking his shoulder.

I got to the end of Spain hill, the pathway to Molco. I looked back; the kid was nowhere to be seen. Had I driven him away? Nah, from what I could tell he would stick to me like glue, whether I wanted him too or not. I'd just wait around for him. Might as well check if there's a wall here while I'm at it - I stuck my hand out, nothing pushed me back. No wall. Good.

Time passed by, first there was 5 minutes gone, then 10 more, then another 5. Before I knew it over half an hour had passed. Where the hell was Tadashi?!  
"That idiot better be here soon!" I said aloud, finding myself looking around for him rather desperately. Oh God… we were nearly down to just 3 hours to complete this mission, and we hadn't even worked it out yet! It could take another hour to work this damn mission out!

Thinking that my partner wouldn't be here for at least a few minutes I decided to work on the mission in peace, without the constant distraction of his voice. Ok; the part about getting to Molco was easy, in theory.  
It was the "Get D and B or Get Erased" part that threw me. The part about a "Two Beat Pattern" was no picnic either. Ugh, this mission was going to consist of waiting to be erased; I just knew it.

I began to ponder what it felt like to be erased – only I didn't get to ponder much because Tadashi made his presence known.  
"Yo!" he yelled, running to my location and… wait, was he holding a drink from Mexican Dog!?

"Nice of you to join us" I said, glaring at the cup in his hand.  
"I thought you'd need alone time – and cold soda helps me think. I didn't get you one, sorry."

Now I was mad for two reasons. For one, he was late. For another, he didn't even bring me a drink, and he still had my suit slung all over his injury.

"Anyway," he continued "I worked it out, sort of."

My head jerked upwards, looking away from the cup to look him in the eyes which, unlike the rest of his torso, weren't red – surprisingly.

"Oh? And what, prey tell, did you work out?"

He sat down, pulled out a sheet of blank paper – a napkin from Mexican Dog, actually (I wondered if he'd brought me one of those) – finally, he began scribbling on said napkin with an old looking felt tip pen – _please_ tell me he didn't get that in the street.

He finished his work and looked at me with glee, sliding the napkin towards me.

It was essentially a bunch of letters scattered in various patterns, the words "Find _D B Get Erased_" lined the top left corner of the fabric – next to it the letters _"F D B G E_" – the previous simply abbreviated, right?  
The bottom right contained the letters reversed – _"E G B D F"_ and the phrase "_Every Good Band Draws Fans" _was next to it.  
Finally, in the centre of the 'page' were five lines, with dot on each line ascending diagonally. It didn't really make 100% sense, but I was sure he was about to explain it.

I was right.

"Well" he began "'Find D and B or Get Erased' abbreviates to 'FDBGE', the reverse of 'EGBDF' – The notes on the lines of the treble clef, man! These notes!" He pointed to the centre of the napkin, to the five ascending dots.  
" It was so obvious, right!?" he said smiling.  
"How does this help exactly?"  
"Well, if EGBDF would be going UP five times diagonally, like in the picture… FDBGE would mean we had to go _down_ five times! So; if we look at the map thing on our phones, we just head down five zones and bang, Mission complete!"

I pulled out my phone to check out the map, the UG Shibuya was divided into Zones, all right. I guess he really had solved that part of the mission.  
"Yeah, well, nice going, I guess." I said "What about 'two beat pattern'? Do you have any ideas?"  
He scratched his head and smiled. I took that as a no.

"Wait!" I exclaimed out loud – blushing at my exclamation despite myself.

Although Tadashi looked happy that I seemed to have an answer I decided to ignore him – once more couldn't hurt. Ok, if he hadn't been able to work it out it would probably have something to do with a genre of music – given that that freak from yesterday thought this mission up it was likely to involve music.  
What type of music wouldn't Tadashi understand terminology of? Probably Opera or Ballet or… ok those weren't technically types of _music_ as such, but who cares? He probably knew as equally little about them as he did about 'high class' music like those played at an orchestra. Oh! That was it! Orchestra!

I snatched the napkin and pen away and began writing as neat as I could while blocking Tadashi from reading over my shoulder. My explanation was shorter and simpler than his; even a moron would get it – which was the general idea.

"See?" I explained "A 'Two Beat Pattern' is a motion in which the conductor moves his arm down and up in a specific shape. This shape would almost be half a triangle. First, the arm goes diagonally down – and then it comes up again, but not in the same direction. I think we have to go down and the up, on the map."  
"All right!" Tadashi screamed out loud, hurting my ears while he got himself all excited about the mission "Let's do this! Where to?!"

"To Towa Records, through Cadoi City; we better hurry, I know 3 hours is plenty, but I want to get this done as soon as possible."

With you messing up as little as possible, _please_.

* * *

"Gah! This lame ass mission doesn't make a bit of sense!" screamed a blonde haired girl as she brought a baseball bat down hard onto the back of a slobbering wolf. "And that fucking reaper didn't make things any easier for us, did she?" Sighing heavily, safe in the knowledge that the battle was over, the girl brushed her clothes down; pink and dirt so didn't go together. "Hey, Mizuki!" She yelled at a girl standing opposite her "I'm talking to you!"

Mizuki, the blonde girl's best friend and partner, was lost in her own musing. How thoughtless it had been to get rid of so many players on the first day leaving a mission like this to be solved by the few lucky enough to escape.

'Oh well, natural selection and all of that' she thought, mentally shrugging off the weight on her mind. Any further thoughts were beaten out of her head however as her partner lightly tapped her on the back of the skull with her bat.

* * *

I followed Stock into Cadoi City – still no other players in sight, were we the only ones left, or the only ones this far into the mission, maybe?  
I heard a groan from my partner, quickly followed by an explanation; "A reaper… just ahead, see?" he said, sighing heavily as he pointed him out.

This reaper wasn't like the other one; he was wearing a black hoodie instead of red, he was also decorated with a few more touches of detail to his overall appearance; wings, for one – though I doubt they'd let him fly, they were far too small to support his body. We got close to him, Stock would probably ask him "who the hell are you?" or "what the hell do you want?" or "get out of our way" – though that last one wasn't a question, it was just as likely that he'd say it.

Before either of us could answer the reaper spoke to us, without being prompted.

"Like a bolt from the blue." Sang the hooded man "It's time for the Reaper Review!"

I looked at Stock, earlier outbursts aside, surely one more question couldn't hurt?

"The what-err re-what?" I asked him "What's that?"

He sighed, "No idea, I guess he'll tell us."

"Today's rather tasty topic is everyone's favourite fast food chain (or should that be 'chain-_link_'?); Mexican Dog!" the guy in black said, wait - why were we standing around listening to him, he wasn't even a red reaper!  
I decided to try and walk past him – only red reapers could put up walls, right?  
Wrong. I bounced back from the invisible force field not too far behind the reaper, jerking my dislocated shoulder in the process – "Ouch!" – Stock looked at me and rolled his eyes, then looked back at the reaper.

"Question 1;" continued the reaper, Stock listened, so did I "How much yen will a hot dog set you back if bought from that fine den of dog?"  
"460 yen!" I exclaimed. It was what I bought before I met Stock in Spain Hill, after all.  
"Hmm, is that so..? Then here we go, onto question 2!" rambled the reaper "How much does the OJ of that very same boutique sell for?"  
"210 yen" I said, nodding to Stock "Same as the cola." – He didn't take his eyes off the reaper.

"Very well, question 3 will really test your mettle; what is the Mexican Dog special?"  
Judging by the surrounding silence of Stock and the Reaper they both seemed to be expecting an answer; trouble is, I didn't have an answer, I stuck to the classics, the hot dog, and the cola!

Would we be erased if we couldn't answer? Nah, that was a little extreme… would we be disqualified from the mission? Again, unlikely… but who knows, right?  
I braced myself to admit to my ignorance, taking the consequences and wrath of the reaper the review. That was, until my saviour spoke.

"The Definitivo Chili Dog - it's their special; and it isn't very good." Stock said with a slight smirk. I would have hugged him in glee if; my arm wasn't in agony; he wouldn't have flung me off of him; the reaper hadn't begun talking again.

"Correct!" He said, emitting a 'bing' sound like there'd be in a quiz show; how exactly had he done that?

Regardless of how he had emitted the sound, said man in black shot away into the distance, clearing the wall in his wake.

"See?" I said to Stock, grin all over my face, "I guess going to Mexican Dog earlier was a good thing."

"Shut it, idiot" he said as he walked along – wait – he called me an idiot, and… was he grinning?!  
"Get back here!" I yelled as I ran after him- smiling myself "Just what were you grinning at?!"

* * *

"So a set of players are headed this way?" sighed a brown haired reaper with her back pressed against the wall "They're sure dragging their heels, though? Just about 2 hours to go…"

She slid down against the wall into a seating position, looking up at the red-dressed support reaper in front of her.

"Oh well, let's just hope the review doesn't slow them down too much, report back to me when they get closer, won't you?"

"Yes, ma'am"

"Oh; there's just one little favour I have to ask of you… all it involves is travelling to Towa Records and back." she said with a sly smile

* * *

Ok, so, according to the map on our phones – pointed out by Tadashi, helpfully enough – we just needed to go 'down' five areas and we should arrive at the end of the mission. This was it, sort of. For today anyway…

"Hey!" Tadashi's voice rang "Pick up the pace, not a reaper in sight with two hours to go, this is the home stretch!"

"Don't tell me to hurry up; you're only a metre in front of me." I said calmly "Bedsides which; there's a red hood up ahead" ('red hood' being the name we had both agreed to call red hooded reapers, while 'black hood' was the name for black clad reapers.)

He jerked his head up to where the reaper was. Or where he had been; he had vanished.

"There's no reaper at all, seeing things?"

"Nah, he walked off. Maybe someone cleared a wall."

That could have been a valid theory; if there had been anyone else at Towa Records – there was only one other person, and they were walking around in the real ground, unable to _see_ walls let alone clear them. I guess he got called away on business, or maybe he was on a break. Who really cares?

"Keep up!" Tadashi yelled, now far ahead of me, heading back into Cadoi City, the first steps in our downward journey.

* * *

"Ma'am, the players I told you about have begun their journey to your position." the Red support reaper said, slightly out of breath – an ailment support reapers rarely suffer.

"And the _other_ task, did you do that as well?"

"I did… however I do worry about the ramifications of removing 3 walls without permission and without players meeting objectives…"

"Bah!" the harrier snapped "You have my permission, after all – player erasure is the goal here, not wall protocol. Honestly, some people have no insight. Not to mention; I will take full responsibility for the actions you took? Now scram, I need to get things ready for my next opponents. Hopefully _they_ will be more entertaining than those vulgar players; my poor pieces were barely a match for them... "

Without a further word she slipped into her own thoughts, washed away by strategies and counter measures.  


* * *

Stock was lagging pretty far behind – not that it was any worry or anything, we pretty much had time to spare an we hadn't hit any walls so far. Maybe this was a reward for getting this far in the mission – a nice little strong from point A to point B – no noise and no reapers.

I had passed through Cadoi City without any trouble and could see the Shibu department store – Stock however was still way back. How hard was it to run instead of walk? Maybe he had something on his mind – I figured I shouldn't bother him when we have so much free time. I sat on the ground to wait for him – it wasn't likely anyone would see me.

I took my wallet out of my pocket and unfolded the picture I had crammed inside of it yesterday – which wasn't easy with a messed up shoulder.  
My mind still hadn't fully processed this whole 'reaper' game' so I decided to seize this moment to take it all in.

The photograph showed me, only me – my brother and sister were nowhere to be found – "That was my entry fee" - saying it out loud helped process the information.

"I wonder if I should tell Stock how I died" I mused out loud, but thought better of the idea "nah, best leave it for now - wont do me any good."

I pulled my shirt up with my non-injured arm and looked at my chest.

"There's no scar, then… that's a relief, I guess."

Ok. My entry fee was my brother and sister, the only way to get them back was to win. Those were the only two important facts; as I saw it, anyway.

"Man, where is he?" I groaned - certain areas of my body hurting after sitting on the ground for a good 20 minutes. 1 hour 40 minutes until erasure.

"Where's who?" asked a slightly sweet voice behind me. Had someone else gotten this far with the mission?

I turned around; the voice belonged to a brunette with glasses. She looked kind of strange, wearing pretty revealing black clothes, all with ragged edges and sporting a black feather scarf… thing around her neck. Not to mention she had sharp looking high heels on – even so, she was slightly smaller than me and was gently holding a bunch of black pins by her waist- so she was a player, at least.

"Well? Can't you speak?"

"No! Sorry, I can." I said, jumping to my feet, wincing as I bashed my arm with my body "I meant my… uh… partner. He's a little far behind, I think."

"Oh? Partners should stick together, always in the same area – in case noise was to show up… what's wrong with your arm?"

"I fell over, basically. It's dislocated. Should be better tomorrow"

"Ah, well – how do you fight noise, if you don't mind my asking?"

"I…" it wasn't that I didn't trust her that stopped me answering, it was the fact that I didn't know. I couldn't really use that velocity pin anymore; so I guess I used "Fire. I use a pin to make fire trails. What about you?"

"Oh… I don't fight noise?" She … asked – kind of.

"Hah" I laughed "Just let you're partner do all the work?"

"Something like that" she said, returning my smile

Wait, where was her partner? Hadn't she said partners should always stick together? And didn't she have pins? Why would she have so many if she didn't fight noise?

"Oh!" she said, calling my attention back her way "Want to see what my pins can do?" she said, smile darkening ever so slightly.

"I… uhh… sure" I said, looking around for her partner. The area was empty from what I could see; apart from the two of us.

She help a pin in her had, it had a weird symbol on it, like an animal drawn in graffiti. "Get ready" she snarled "Show me just what you can do!"

I closed my eyes, waiting for her psych to hit me - like a deer in headlights.

The sound of her pin activating failed to reach my ears – I opened my eyes again - the pin that was once in her hand had disappeared. She was looking around for it; I looked around too – only I was looking for a clue to tell me what the hell she wanted from me.

"She's a reaper" said a familiar voice behind me "A harrier reaper. They act independently in the game to erase players. Mostly they re bound by certain constraints- like the inability to attack players directly. They summon noise from pins to do their dirty work for them."

"You took your time getting here" I smirked, looking at my rescuer and partner.

"I got here about the same time you did"

"Then where the hell were you?!"

"I was out of sight – watching her watch you. And believe me – she had been watching for a long while too, patiently waiting for your partner to show up before she could erase you, us, both of us."

The harrier looked at Stock, and then growled as he produced a small object from his pocket. It was the pin she had nearly used on me!

"Lost something?" he mocked "Oh, yeah, Tadashi, the reapers summon noise from pins, like I told you. This is one of those pins. I guess it wouldn't hurt if you wanted to hang onto it, consider it payment for drawing her out, why don't you?" he said, tossing me the pin. I pocketed it without giving it another look, for now anyway. Stock would probably said there was more important matters to worry about and yelled at me.

Wait! That bastard used me as bait! Without my consent, too! After this reaper left us alone I was _really_ gonna give him what for!

That being said, he had a serious look on his face, maybe this reaper was a threat, especially when I was in no real fighting condition.

"Oh well" the harrier half-sighed half-screamed while looking extremely pissed off "Keep it, once I erase you it wont matter, time to bring out my most feared noise. Be grateful, I don't bring this out for just _any_ old players!"

She made a small sound of glee and produced a second black pin, tightening her grip on this one, making sure it wasn't stolen away from her.

"Now…" she said, regaining her composure "Please put on a good show for me; I've been planning this move all day long!"

The pin made the usual activation noise and the ground around us began to shake as the noise she was calling materialised in front of us. First its gigantic feet, then its towering torso, followed by its arms and ferocious head. This thing was ridiculously big, and unlike a normal T-rex its arms were long enough to claw its prey. It was definitely noise alright – it had the graffiti-like tribal markings in place of certain limbs.

Its beady eyes spun our way as it let out a deafening roar – spittle and a strong stench came our way, Stock covered his nose with his shirt and I did the same with my hand.

"Behold!" the harrier in front of us cackled "My most treasured piece, My Tyrannosaurus-Noise!"

"Listen up Tadashi" Stock said "I know it's hardly ideal, but you're going to have to fight too. Just don't use that pin that hurt your arm - use your fire from a safe distance and I'll keep its attention focuses mainly on me. We can do this, I promise."

I gripped my fire pin in my able hand and pulled it from its position on my hoodie.

The dinosaur in front of us began to charge our way, teeth chomping and destroying the unlucky path in its way.  
Stock gripped my hoodie and nodded, he was going to throw me to a safer point.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Ready."

"Here we go!" I yelled as my body was hurled through the air – landing me a good distance away from the noise, a perfect spot from which to launch barrages of fire at it. The dinosaur reached Stock's position and its jaws shut, dust and rubble were sent flying skywards before several slabs of brick were brought back down on top of the beast; causing it to howl out in pain and jump backwards.

In the rubble and dust Stock stood calmly, large chunks of rubble, bricks and even a traffic cone orbited his body. The dinosaur lunged in for a second attack, recovering from the initial shock of being hurt by a player, probably.

Stock jumped to the side – the orbiting items followed him - dodging a long claw, dodged to the other side to dodge several sharp teeth and finally managed to throw his hands forward, sending the entire cache of projectiles straight into the noise's face – traffic cone hitting it square in one eye, the biggest rock in the other eye. Something was wrong, however. He must have landed badly or something because he let out a cry of pain; which the dinosaur apparently used to tell where he was standing.

I considered running over to help, but what good would I have done? I had one arm to use and no powerful psychs to fight with, not to mention I was shaking in fear. This thing was enormous. There was no way we were going to be able to take it on alone… and we had five more days of this ahead of us! I punched the ground with my good arm, which was also shaking. Why? Why wasn't stock as scared as I was? He was standing toe to toe with that monster and I wasn't even fighting it, I was just watching the events unfold!

A roar from the dinosaur caused me to look up, it was backing off from some kids bicycle that stock had sent flying though the air, followed by a road works sign and one of the advertisement boards outside of the department store.

That's when it hit me; he was giving it his all and couldn't beat this thing… there wasn't any way we could beat it alone, we weren't supposed to! That was why we needed to form a pact! He must have been waiting for me to join him but I stood by in fear… he had told me to use my fire pin to back him up, that was why he was standing so close; he was keeping the things attention on him so I'd be safe!

I took the pin and aimed at the T-rex noise, the fire earlier today hadn't been impressive at all, far too small and slow moving to hurt a wolf, let alone a tyrannosaurus rex. No, this time would be different! The fire would be huge because it was a bigger enemy, right?

Wrong. The fire trail was pathetic; it barely made it close to the monster before it burned out. The pin went grey again. Great.

Stock continued his struggle of dodging and attacking, now having to recycle the objects he was throwing, which broke up against the noise's hard skin every time they hit against it – hardly ideal. On top of that he looked beat. He was getting slower too, I had to do something soon!

I felt a slight vibration from my hand, more like someone tapping me on the shoulder, and heard a slight "bling" noise. The fire pin had returned to its original style, ready to be used again. I jumped as best I could over the rubble that had been kicked up during the fight, getting as close as possible to use the fire pin. I dodged a brick which might have been thrown by Stock and barely dodged the dinosaur's tail as it swung past me. Unfortunately I didn't manage to dodge it on the return trip and was sent flying into the department store wall. Painful would be an understatement. The snarling face of the dinosaur turned round to stare at me with its angry beady eyes. It snarled for a split second before lunging its jaws at me. I closed my eyes and braced myself. That was it then? Was this how I was going to die? Eaten by a T-rex in Shibuya? At least it wasn't slipping in the shower, I guess.

"Open your eyes, damn it" said an out of breath voice, It belonged to Stock. Had he saved me? "Come on, stay with me!" he yelled, slapping me across the face

I opened my eyes and coughed, ridding my body of some of the dust from its brief encounter with the department store wall.

Stock leaned away, covering his own mouth – "That's disgusting, listen. I managed to lose that thing for a second; we can rest for about 30 seconds, so listen."

"You saved me?" I asked – regardless of how clear the answer was.

"Don't mention it. We don't have long. I can't keep this up much longer… I'm almost out of breath, so we need to end it as soon as possible. I know you're scared, Tadashi… truth is I am too, because I… I…"

Whatever he was trying to say was interrupted by a harsh growling sound, the dinosaur had found its prey once more.

"MOVE!" Stock yelled at me. I did.

It bit at us several times, if Stock hadn't pulled me out of the way on the fifth bite I'd be dinosaur food. Literally!

Then the worst thing possible happened. I slipped. I fell. I landed on my back, looking up at the sky and the towering tyrannosaurus, which was looking down at me. I threw my hand up at it, sending a pitiful amount of fire and a few sparks its way. I scrabbled to my feet, but even then I couldn't run fast enough to escape.

It pulled its head back and bared its sharp teeth, just in time to have almost all of them broken clean off by a speeding car before the car itself blew up. That's right. A car – for driving in – had come out of nowhere and smashed the dinosaur in the face and then had blown up. The force of the blast was incredible. My entire being was overcome with a wave of heat – accompanied with a stringing coldness on my skin. My body was forced metres away, the blast essentially disintegrated the jacket Stock had given me – and singed many parts of my own clothes.

I hit the ground hard and staggered to my feet. I heard the sound of someone falling over and looked to my side where my partner had landed – landed and fallen to his knees.

That car… don't tell me… _he_ had thrown it? I knew he could move things, sort of like psychic powers, but I had no idea they could be that… _big_.

The smoke from the explosion was everywhere, breathing wouldn't be easy – I picked Stock up and slung him over my shoulder, with one arm, and began to limp to a more smoke free area.

"Still with me?" I asked cautiously

"I guess" he said in a quiet voice

"You gonna be ok?"

"…just need a little rest…" his voice was quieter now. I sat him down against some rock that he had thrown over this way. Maybe he had used too much of his psych abilities… and now he was paying the price for it. Shit… he'd die at this rate, how the hell could I save him now!? I'm pretty sure the pharmacy would be open, but they wouldn't sell anything to cure death-by-psychic-powers. That's when it hit me… the game healed wounds after each day! If we completed the mission he'd be fine!

"Hey! Stock! We won; I can carry you to the end of the mission, you'll be fine tomorrow."

"No…" he said, again in that quiet voice. Oh god was he dying right now!?

"No?! But it's right over there! I'm taking you there whether you wanna stay here and die or not!"

I reached to pick him up, but his hand caught mine, defying my efforts.

His hair was matted down with sweat and he was barely breathing – but he still opened his eyes and gave a slight smile.

"Its not done yet… you have to do the rest. Hurry up… timer's ticking."

His head slumped back down, he was unconscious but breathing.

"What's not done yet?!" I asked desperately. Was there something about the mission that I hadn't seen? I plunged my hand into my pocket and pulled out my phone – which was still in one piece, thankfully.

Before I managed to load the mission mail however, a low growl was heard outside of the department store. I looked over at the smoking wreckage in disbelief. There was no way this was happening! What sort of monster could be alive after a direct hit like that, it should be dead!

But alive it was. A graffiti pattern arm was visible, then the second arm, then the head. It looked over at us, Stock in particular. I looked back at Stock too – if he was willing to trust me then I would try and do him proud. I slid off my hoodie and spread it over his body like a blanket.

The dinosaur ran toward us. I pushed my arm and fire pin forward again and roared myself, finding my own body struggling to deal with how much power I was putting out. Flames billowed out from my hand into an enormous net – engulfing the dinosaur and everything else, mixing with the smoke in the area like two very vibrant colours of paint.

The dinosaur roared a lot from inside the fire, I ran forward, getting closer in order to hit it with more fire was priority number 1 – finishing this as quick as possible was priority number 2 keeping the noise from getting Stock was priority number 3. The dinosaur ran out of the smoke and fire with intense speed, its claw batting me to the side as it journeyed to Stocks body, stopping just short of him – sniffing at him for signs of life.

I stood up from where I'd landed. Damn it! This fire wasn't doing the job… and I couldn't use that pin without pulling an arm out of its socket. What was it Stock had said? - "The shoulder is the only thing that can be dislocated because of the way the joint is positioned"?

The dinosaur seemed to have found some signs of life in Stock, because it bared its teeth like it had done when it was about to eat me. I took that pin and placed it in my boots before I set off running.

I ran up a pile of debris, using it as a ramp I kicked off the ground, forcing my way as high as I possibly could. Directly below me, the dinosaur lowered its mouth, broken teeth prepared to chew Stock to pieces. I yelled at the top of my voice, firing balls of fire at the beast, twisting their movements aiming to strike from all directions. They each hit with precision, the dinosaur looked around in confusion.

I was at the peak of my jump. This was it. I wasn't going to be scared of that thing down there anymore. Stock had risked his life to save me and was lying down there dying because of it. It was my turn to return the favour. My ascension to the heavens became a sharp decent to the ground with breakneck speed. I had no idea how high I was, but the people from the RG were like ants.

Air rushed past my face, stinging the burns from the car explosion.

Down below I noticed the dinosaur still looking for my location. Soon, though, its attention turned back to Stock – it was risky but I managed to call its attention into the air by hitting it directly on the skull with a fresh wave of fire.

It looked up, I braced myself. 10 seconds till impact.

It opened its mouth. 5 seconds till impact.

I pulled my foot back as far I could. 3 seconds till impact.

I took in a breath. 1 second till impact.

**"SHIBUYA STOMPING GROUND!!!"** I yelled at the top of my voice, smashing the dinosaur's upper jaw with my boot. Direct hit!

The blast wave of my kick was astounding; the dinosaurs jaw was forced shut, teeth met gum in painful unison, its head slammed full force into the concrete ground, its body shortly followed, its legs gave way soon after, dust was blown off in all directions, the very ground we stood on cracked beyond reasonable repair. I was sent back into the air, moving in what felt like slow motion. Even the sound around us had been blown away, no growling from the dinosaur – I couldn't even hear my own breathing, just the calming mumble of the RG.

I landed on the ground, my back to the dinosaur, facing Stock's still breathing, still unconscious body. I felt a final wave of air as the dinosaur behind us burst into dust. I looked back; the dinosaur had left a few pins in the small crater its body had created. They weren't important at the time so I just scooped Stock over my shoulder and began limping over towards the West Exit bus terminal, forgetting all about that Harrier reaper.

"Hey!" called someone whose voice I couldn't quite place "Wait up!"

* * *

"Gee, Tack. They sure gave you a hidin' and a half." Laughed a figure behind the defeated Harrier reaper

"My name is _Takara_ "she snarled back "And just what are you doing here, huh?!"

"Calm yourself, Takara. I just caught word of some trickster clearing walls. I only caught the last legs of this lil scuffle, but golly I'm glad I did. Remind me never to get under that kid's shoes, will ya?"

Takara sighed, "I put up some walls, what happened to them? You should have been kept out."

"I cleared em, obviously. That was a pretty dumb question, you sure you're as smart as all that?

Takara glared at him before shrugging her shoulders – "oh well, I'll get them next time."

"Yuh huh, I'm sure you will. Anyway - I'm busy, gotta split hon - found a pair of 'interesting' players myself; leftovers from last week's game."  


* * *

"So" the red haired girl said as she unclipped a pin from her t-shirt "You and your partner took on that T-rex alone? Pretty impressive."

"Yeah" I said, setting Stock down against Hachiko's statue "You saw that?"

"Yep, we would have helped" she said, indicating to her blue/green haired partner dressed in Hip Snake fashion "but a wall stopped us from getting in, it disappeared just as the noise did."

The girl with the blue/green hair placed the girl with red hair's pin against my forehead - causing me to blush a little, thankfully hidden by the dirt and ash on my face – and activated its psych. My entire body felt lighter, the pain in my arm was lifted and I could even move it again!

"Healing pin" her friend explained "It lets you heal wounds. It only seems to be useable a small number of times – but at least you're better now. Anyway, it's about time to heal your friend – best not leave him any longer."

The blue haired girl, the taller of the two, placed the pin against Stock's forehead and activated the psych once more.

My eyes flicked open, and shut, and open again a few times – like I had just woken from a deep sleep. Where the hell was I?  
I took a groggy look around, noting that I was at Hachiko in Shibuya with a blue haired girl looking directly at me, inches from my face. Question 1; who was she. Question 2; why was I in Shibuya, Question 3;how long had I been out cold, Question 4; why was I wearing a burnt and torn red hoodie?

Unfortunately, before I could conjure up some answers, a bystander put a hand on each of my shoulders. Due to his appearance – medium length red hair, dirty face, dry blood in places – I might have been scared, but I was too out of it to care at the moment, did I know this kid?

"Dude, you're alive! I mean, you're dead, but not gone, and I, I mean we, we beat that dinosaur back there!!" Tears were forming around his eyes, until the blue haired girl pulled him away from me – let the records show that I owe her one.

"Give him some space, it's likely that he doesn't remember things clearly right now, give him a few minutes to rest" she explained in a calm voice

And so the kid in red spoke to the blue haired girl and her red haired friend for a good few minutes. Something must have surprised him because he began claiming "I didn't know phones could do that!" while waving his own cell phone around like a jack ass, man I hope I don't know him.

Wait, had he said something about a dinosaur? Why did that seem familiar? And what the hell did he mean I was dead? I was alive, in Shibuya.

Suddenly I remembered, and suddenly I groaned. Sure I was in Shibuya, but I was dead – the Reaper's Game – entry fees and Noise, and that nut job reaper who summoned the dinosaur that Tadashi, my partner, had told me about.

"Are you ok?" asked the blue haired girl "My name is Hoshiko, What's your name? Do you remember?"

"Uh, yeah, I remember… my name is Suttoku" I said while struggling to my feet. The girl stopped me, insisting that I rest a little longer.

"What happened with the noise!?" I blurted out as soon as I remembered – had these girls shown up and saved us? The last thing I could recall was that the car I had thrown hadn't erased it.

"Keep calm, everything's fine." Hoshiko said "Your partner erased the noise shortly after you lost consciousness."

I blinked, not quite believing what I'd heard, Tadashi had been scared out of his mind at first – he had finished the noise after my attack, and he'd done it alone?

"Akako, my partner over there, and I were stuck on the other side of a wall which we couldn't clear, we managed to use a healing pin to heal your wounds, otherwise you both might have been erased by this point."

That would certainly explain why she was so close when I woke up – she was healing me, and Tadashi had his injuries cured too?

I looked over his way, he was engaged in conversation with that other girl, Akako – and it looked like she was handing him a bunch of pins. What a freeloader!

"Those are the pins which the noise left behind; your partner must have forgotten to take them." Hoshiko Explained. Geez, was this girl reading my mind?!

Regardless of any telepathic powers she may have possessed she helped me to my feet and, after making sure I was feeling fine, let me walk over to Tadashi unassisted.

"Where's my jacket?" I asked him, looking at his healthy shoulder

"Uh…" Great, I did _not_ like the sound of that "It got, um, ruined… Well, it was blown apart; only a sleeve was left and it got buried under a lot of rubble"

"You moron, that was an expensive piece of clothing!"

"You're the moron, why didn't you tell me you were going to throw a car at that thing?!" He yelled in defence.

"Shouldn't we head to the end of the mission then?" said Akako, she had a good point, too – the timer was now sitting at just over an hour to go, we couldn't risk any more time being stolen away from us.

"Yeah, let's go" Tadashi said, leading the way – not that there was long to go until we reached the bus terminal, mind you.

A few minutes after we got to the bus terminal and the timer vanished a familiar and obnoxious voice from the other day could be heard from all over the place.

"Hey players, how're you all doin' today? Hope you weren't waiting too long!"

The voice in question belonged to the games "GM" – and it was being amplified and accompanied by the increasingly loud intro of another booming rock song. Oh great. I covered my ears in anticipation, Tadashi's face was covered with a grin, Hoshiko and Akako stood, confused at the parallel of my partner and me.

The strings on the golden guitar were strummed powerfully, causing the 2 girls to cover their ears, and the song began in full swing. During the song/attack on the ears-of-the-hearing Tadashi took out his phone and snapped a picture of the manic-minstrel on top of the makeshift stage.

"Don't encourage him!" I screamed, Tadashi didn't hear me and continued cheering. Stupid is as stupid does, I guess.

"I'm sending you all my love. I want your love. I want your love and soul!!" Repeated Allegro, the GM – not once, but three times, why did he have to sing the last line three times, honestly? Not that I was complaining, at least it meant his song was over, right?

"Sing the one from yesterday!" Tadashi yelled, I think – my ears were still ringing from that barrage.

"No can do, I'm afraid" Allegro sighed, putting his amp and guitar back into their respective pins "My talent's being rationed; Mr Hiraku says no more and no less than one song a day, no repeats either."

Who was 'Mr Hiraku' and why was this guys music being forced on us only once a day, and why without repeats?

"So Hiraku is your manager?" Tadashi chimed in

"Something like that, yeah." Allegro said with a forced laugh

"Well, I thought it was awesome! Don't let your manager get you down, do what feels right in your own heart, right?!"

"Hah! Thanks man." He said as he took a drink of water "Me and you? We're on the same frequency kid, I like that. I hope to see you guys on day 3, don't disappoint me!"

The freak walked off, whistling the backbeat to the song he had just played,

"Good riddance." I muttered as my vision blackened again.

**- Extinction -

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**A/N**: Not as quick an update as we'd planned but hey, Christmas makes fools of us all. Hopefully you'll enjoy this chapter. Stay tuned for the next chapter!


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